Heroic (4.00 / 1)

An impressive piece of work, one which anyone interested in replacing our present corrupt system with one which might actually be worthy of being called Democratic should take the time to study.

I've often complained that we talk about how too much, and not enough about why, largely because it's easier. While I still think that my complaint is largely justified, I'll gladly make an exception in the case of Nancy's work. With the Democratic Party a cesspool of cheap grifters, labor unions reduced to stabbing each other in the back, and universities -- the whole educational system, in fact -- under systematic attack by a coalition of know-nothings and corporate monstrosities unwilling to tolerate any rivals at all, do-it-yourself has become the order of the day.

Even if Nancy's complete system is never put into place, something very like it will have to be. No matter which fork in the road history takes, she deserves a lot of credit for accepting the challenge of what I call Post-Industrial Politics at both a theoretical and functional level. Will her toolkit be a successful model of what's to come? I don't know, but I can certainly say that it's stimulated my own thinking.

---

by: William Timberman @ Sat Jul 11, 2009 at 12:59:06 PM CDT

My Fault, Not Nancy's (4.00 / 2)

I've often complained that we talk about how too much, and not enough about why, largely because it's easier. While I still think that my complaint is largely justified, I'll gladly make an exception in the case of Nancy's work

Actually, Nancy does have a whole lot of why, which you can find in her original diary here.  However, as good as that may have been, it was not unique, and I wanted to focus here on what was unique.

Her proposal reminds me of the email tagline I had for many, many years: "Let's put the information back in the informaation age."

"Senate passes expanded GI bill despite Bush, McCain opposition"

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by: Paul Rosenberg @ Sat Jul 11, 2009 at 13:09:03 PM CDT

[ Parent ]

Apologies for the misunderstanding (0.00 / 0)

Yes, I agree that she's been very thorough about giving us the why part as well. It's just that the how part seems the real innovation, or at least it's the part which seems uniquely valuable to me.

It's an old, old problem. Political parties think only about how, and for the most part only a subset of that: how to win. The end result is there for everyone to see, and it ain't pretty.

Us radical types think a lot about why, but apart from a few real innovators, like Alinsky and maybe Tom Hayden back in his Newark days, none of us has done how very well. Once organic communities of interest -- and, to be honest, their ward-heelers -- disappear, we get identity politics at best, and at worst, the guy with the most money to burn generally has his way with us.

Getting the ideas out there helps, of course, and your point about how to engage non-activist ordinary citizens is well taken -- creating communities of the disaffected is tempting in that regard. That's what conservative demagogues and astroturf operations have done for forty years, and it worked well for them for a while.

The problem, of course, is that demagoguery as opposed to policy discussions has a nasty tendency to turn around and bite you in the ass, a la Sarah Palin. Anyway, I think Nancy's analysis is at least partially persuasive about why what she's proposing will work. In any event, despite some skepticism on my part, I really have nothing better to offer.

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by: William Timberman @ Sat Jul 11, 2009 at 13:38:49 PM CDT

[ Parent ]

Yes, You've Hit the Nail on the Head! (4.00 / 2)

What else is there to offer that will fundamentally CHANGE THE SYSTEM so that the representatives we elect do not flout the popular and voters can decide what the nation's policy priorities will be and what candidates they want to run and elect to enact them?

We have just spent two years on so-called democratic elections to elect a Democratic president who has already reneged on his core campaign promises, notably his anti-war message and pledge to get out of Iraq (U.S. forces will remain in control of Iraq for the foreseeable future and he has now expanded Bush's "war on terror" into a massive new military engagement on two new fronts, Afghanistan and Pakistan).

Worse still, Obama is continuing and even expanding Bush's policy of indefinitely detaining suspects without charges, which is an egregious violation of international law and domestic U.S. laws.

In addition, despite his story about his mother's difficulties fighting cancer and insurance companies, he is unwilling to fight for the single payer system a majority of Americans demand. He can not even muster the courage to come out in favor of the public option that is the fall back position of Congressional lawmakers who can not bring themselves to oppose the insurance companies that have funded their election campaigns.

Quite clearly, unless we CHANGE THE SYSTEM, we will continue to be railroaded by our undemocratic electoral system into electing politicians who flout the popular will, just as President Obama and Congress are doing virtually across the board.

So I ask you, Mr. Timberman, and Open Left members, what is it that we, progressive activists, can do to CHANGE THE SYSTEM so that we voters set the nation's policy agendas and elect representatives who will enact them into law?

Or are we going to just have to put up with the current system and go through these electoral shams every couple of years to elect representatives who flout our will?

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by: Nancy Bordier @ Sat Jul 11, 2009 at 17:33:02 PM CDT

[ Parent ]

Nancy, I'm with you in Rockland.... (4.00 / 1)

What more can I say? You walk it like you talk it, and I both respect what you have to say, and admire the effort it took to put it together. Nothing I've said here should be construed as a substantive criticism. My reservations, such as they are, are entirely based on what I know about human psychology, which at best is far from definitive.

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by: William Timberman @ Sat Jul 11, 2009 at 18:48:02 PM CDT

[ Parent ]

All I was asking (4.00 / 1)

was what are our alternatives, which is what I think you were intimating also.

It would take years and possibly decades to change the system by trying to change electoral laws, voting rules, etc.

We should of course keep trying to make these changes, but if voters can be empowered by inventions like mine to set the agenda and basically play the role that political parties play of gathering voters together under a common policy agenda that will induce them to vote for party candidates, then my proposl is a more efficient and effective way to go.

Voters using my invention can do the exact same thing that political parties do while keeping control of policy agenda-setting, building consensus about policy priorities, and using their agenda to drive electoral processes.

Since the voters decide the agenda and who runs and gets elected to implement the agenda, what do political parties do that voters using my invention can't do? In the case of my invention, it is infinitely scalable so that any number of voters can join together to consensually build shared agendas at any level of government and run candidates at that level.

Voters using the invention can use it inside existing political parties, which would be the idea strategy, but if the major parties cling to their special interest financiers, voters can also break away from them and start their own parties and build an electoral base across party lines.

This is a far more democratic way to determine policy agendas and pick candidates to run on these platforms than the convoluted, obfuscating methods used by the two major political parties.

While I know that the primary system evolved and grew out of historical circumstances, the comical, undemocratic and agonizingly prolonged primary and general election processes in America are a national disgrace because after all the time and expense they entail, they result in the election of lawmakers who chronically flout the popular will.  

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by: Nancy Bordier @ Sat Jul 11, 2009 at 19:17:18 PM CDT

[ Parent ]

At first glance, this is rather impressive (4.00 / 1)

I especially like the focus on Winning Voting Blocs, since that's where the rubber meets the road.

Given that Obama's campaign has shown the Establishment types how to use social networking apps to manipulate/campaign, this could prove a handy antidote. A foil against authoritarian networking, which will become the norm by the 2012 election cycle, if we don't front-run it.

"In our country, the lie has become not just a moral category but a pillar of the State" -- Alexander Solzhenitsyn

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by: Emocrat @ Sat Jul 11, 2009 at 13:30:33 PM CDT

Nancy Talks More About This (4.00 / 1)

In her online book, Re-Inventing Democracy.  Just click on the link, and search for "Obama's Pre-Election Web Strategy".  The following section, "Obama's Post-Election Web Strategy", is also worth a read.

"Senate passes expanded GI bill despite Bush, McCain opposition"

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by: Paul Rosenberg @ Sat Jul 11, 2009 at 13:54:10 PM CDT

[ Parent ]

Yeah, I'm going to look into this more (4.00 / 3)

No one has to come up with a silver bullet, but I do appreciate this kind of effort at enabling more of a Big Picture approach.

Since the commons have been largely destroyed by the corporate dominance of government, this strikes me as one means of establishing a new commons, which would feed into Timberman's legitimate concerns about the discussion of Why, etc.

"In our country, the lie has become not just a moral category but a pillar of the State" -- Alexander Solzhenitsyn

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by: Emocrat @ Sat Jul 11, 2009 at 15:31:41 PM CDT

[ Parent ]

It looks like this tool (4.00 / 2)

could be used to organize around and promote the idea of fundamental changes in how we vote - specifically instant runoff voting (IRV) and/or proportional representation. It seems to me that's the only way we can make so-called "Third Parties" truly viable.  

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by: Oaktown Girl @ Sat Jul 11, 2009 at 13:48:41 PM CDT

I am currently building (4.00 / 2)

a polling archive.  I am happy to post it anywhere people would suggest - if OpenLeft is interested I am more than happy to give the informtion I have.  Ideally, though, we could identify a group that would agree to build the archive, since the actual work of building the data collection is tedious to say the least.  

One of the reasons that I did my research two years ago about polling history was because I knew that it was being used to effectively stiffle dissent within the Democratic Party.  The Presidential Primary process is in fact far more open than largely believed, the effective gatekeepers are really the press.

Polling data is extremely effective in rebutting the assumptions of the national press corp.  

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by: fladem @ Sat Jul 11, 2009 at 14:02:46 PM CDT

Sounds Interesting To Me (4.00 / 2)

I'm not management, but just speaking personally this sounds like a very good idea.

However, the Soapblox software we use--which is wonderfully versatile and cost-effective for its intended purpose--might not make this the best fit directly on the blog's site itself.  Still, creating an online archive using Open Left as a portal would be almost the same thing from a user's POV.  So I'd definitely support the idea.

"Senate passes expanded GI bill despite Bush, McCain opposition"

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by: Paul Rosenberg @ Sat Jul 11, 2009 at 14:22:19 PM CDT

[ Parent ]

Good Idea! (0.00 / 0)

The polling archive is a great idea!

The more we pool our various tools, inventions, innovations for democratizing the political process, the sooner the emerging progressive majority is going to get control of government.

You are right on about the efforts to stiffle dissent with the Democratic Party. That's what most formal organization do as they mature. They shove their original mission into the background and concentrate on preserving the power and prerogatives of those who are running the organization and, in the case of party candidates, benefiting from its existence.

Once voters at the grassroots start creating self-organizing political networks around shared policy agendas and consensus forming mechanisms, they will be able to break the monopoly of organized political parties. For they will be able to compete with party units at the local level in terms of agenda setting and running and electing candidates in primaries and general elections.

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by: Nancy Bordier @ Sat Jul 11, 2009 at 18:50:43 PM CDT

[ Parent ]

A few of the basics are wrong (0.00 / 0)

... but I applaud the concept. The progressive community has been amazingly blind to the actual numbers.

From '04 to '08, the biggest change by far was growth of and swing of the Latino vote. That alone accounted for half of Obama's margin. The other major factor was the collapse of GOP ID - they either became swing voters or stayed home. Improvements in young voters were swamped by these two factors, especially when you think that there are so man young Latinos.

Now, let's look at the word, "progressive." Unfortunately in these discussions, it's a receptacle for the dreams of the audience, and on the Net, that audience is overwhelmingly white, male, socially liberal, upper income and highly educated. It's a demographic that barely relates to a party whose base is female, working class, minority and economically populist for whom healthcare, college and good jobs are anything but entitlements.

I strongly agree that we must put in place the tools to allow regular non-tech savvy Democrats to set the agenda for the goals we can all rally behind: universal healthcare with at least the option of Medicare for all, free public college for all qualified lower income students and ending NCLB.

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by: Pacific John @ Sat Jul 11, 2009 at 14:34:23 PM CDT

I should put a point on this: (0.00 / 0)

The emphasis on Millennials to the exclusion of other voters is a disaster waiting to happen. Look at the primary, despite huge pro-Obama, anti-Hillary new and traditional media bias, more than half of Democrats voted for Clinton. By March of '08, the volunteer forces were of similar size, but like every campaign, we can guarantee that the older vols of the two campaigns will have the staying power. Despite the hoopla of '04, a year later, like every election, it was the retirees on party phone banks and the kids were vapor.

Now, will virtual organizing tools change the paradigm and swell the numbers of young experienced vols? I doubt it. The thing any experienced field person will tell you is, people do what they want, and it is an organizer's job to facilitate willing participation. The bulk of willing participants will always be new young volunteers who have not yet started careers, and older, established party regulars. Our tools need to target those two groups, and the low hanging fruit will come to the innovators who figure out how to empower Democrats outside of the natural Netroots demographic. I should say, there is cause for optimism. I see a lot of mothers and grandmothers with smart phones and facebook accounts.

The question for us is, how do we harness people's natural talents and traditional social networks?

I would turn the problem upside down and ask, how can we get the maximum real life political action per online hour? The paradox is that the Hillary campaign generated by far the most votes per Internet-hour (by a factor of 10? 50? 100?), and did so by empowering face-to-face social networks with efficient use of electronic organizing. Hillary networks turned out to be underground channels driven from sight by the pro-Obama roar.

Here's an example of a highly efficient organizing: Clinton's name was entered into nomination primarily by an extremely effective blend of virtual and real life action. To avoid charges of wrecking the party, Clinton completely suspended communication with her delegates, and within most states, delegates were not even given email lists. Famously, at the Mayflower Hotel meeting with Clinton bundlers, Obama discouraged talk of Clinton's name being entered into nomination, or of a traditional roll call.

Enter Hillary's delegates. A few found the DNC rule that a candidate be entered into nomination with 300 delegates endorsing the petition. Mind you, there were no contact lists. They found each other by traditional social networking and organizing techniques, and gathered stack of well over 300 notarized signatures, forcing the convention to recognize the nomination, the elected delegates and half of the party's 36 million primary voters.  

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by: Pacific John @ Sat Jul 11, 2009 at 15:13:58 PM CDT

[ Parent ]

One Thing You're Not Considering (4.00 / 1)

Is that these are not normal times.  Times of turbulence and distress tend to draw in a larger crop of new volunteers, and while a larger crop may have a larger drop-off as well, the net is still larger in the end. Up until the 60s, it was those who got active in the 1930s who dominated the Dem volunteer corps.  Going forward from then, it was those who first got involved in the 60s who formed the next major demographic group.  It seems quite expectable that this generation will do the same.

"Senate passes expanded GI bill despite Bush, McCain opposition"

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by: Paul Rosenberg @ Sat Jul 11, 2009 at 15:40:59 PM CDT

[ Parent ]

I'm an optimist who is always scanning for opportunities (4.00 / 1)

but I don't see a special crop of young veteran volunteers. The proof is Obama's failed April pro-budget canvass. I think we were all surprised that he couldn't get more activity out of his 13 million person list. I saw a lot more activity at MoveOn's anti-war actions from a much smaller list. Quite a few have observed that '08 was a one-person movement with the main goal achieved on election day, not a movement with permanent infrastructure and clear policies.

You are of course right about turbulent times - impeachment, the 2000 election and the Iraq War gave us our current movement. As Alterman noted early in the Bush administration, we were starting with nothing, and had to build everything at once.

But what I keep having to point out is, the movement, as it is, has not enfranchised many, maybe most, willing participants, those non-creative class types who are too busy surviving to spend all day on the computer. They are our low hanging fruit, from productivity standpoint and a democratic standpoint. Not only is it smart to target them, it's a moral obligation.

***

I've been reflecting on what happens to every young crop of activists. Since I started in '96, every two years I've seen brilliant, hard working organizers show up, then disappear. Very few stay in campaign politics, almost none. I see two reasons, one that field organizers are often college students or new grads who can afford to donate their lives 24/7 for a campaign season for next to no pay. Most of these people are paid staff hoping to find a career in public service. The second reason I learned by hard experience: these people disappear for good when they get real jobs. Last year, I went through my rolodex for all of the superstars I'd been in the field with over the years, and was not able to recruit even an hour of phone banking time. These former superstars now work for county agencies, DC nonprofits, federal agencies, etc., and have decided they have put in their time, at the ripe old age of 30-something. They have lives, payments and jobs.

A perfect example: I have an acquaintance who ran the field campaign in Nevada. He was profiled by Zack Exley as a superstar and prototypical new activist whose golden gift should be retained at all costs. Where is he now? He got a job as liaison between the White House and State Dept. I doubt I'll see him in the field again.

This is about economics. There isn't money to cultivate and retain field organizers, but there are millions of career positions in government. Rarely, an entrepreneurial public official will keep field people in holding jobs between campaigns, few have that luxury or vision.

Which gets us back to my point, people like those of us here who are always around on campaigns are not part of a Millennial demographic bulge. We have resources and motivation, and we aren't going to disappear because we find a life. It's the same every two years. Come to think of it, most of the best field campaign people I know have no financial ties politics, they are entrepreneurs who have the financial ability to donate months of time. They also happen to be vols rather than staff.

I need to end on a note of cynicism. Because this is about money, the same corrupting influence we see with journalists happens with campaign staff. There is no way people are going to quit a job and do the right thing, like campaigning for a candidate they believe in. And in retrospect, we can see that campaigns are never what they could have been. We recall a superstars, but a lot of staffers weren't productive.

Famously, the Hillary campaign staff was mostly ineffective until it embraced volunteers in March (and in NH and Nevada, where it had embraced vols for months). But the Obama campaign, for all the hype, had to be carried across the finish line gasping, by the press, by online groups and by party establishment and operatives. The awesome Obama field campaign got less and less productive as it went on. On the day of Oregon and Kentucky, states with the same size voter pools, Hillary netted well over 100,000 votes. The hidden story of that day was, OR had mediocre turnout, especially for a vote by mail election, and KY turned out its voters. That's a clear reflection of the two field campaigns in full stride.

In other words, the lessons we need to learn are both more complicated and more basic than the common narratives the '08 cycle generated. And they are the same as identified by Alinsky, regular people, not those who are well off, need to be empowered.

---

by: Pacific John @ Sat Jul 11, 2009 at 18:02:58 PM CDT

[ Parent ]

Back to the Future and Millennials (4.00 / 2)

Let me first address this issue of volunteers.

One of the main reasons voters need to be "mobilized" by armies of volunteers, and electoral candidates need to raise huge sums of money to "get their message out" is that voters did not create the message in the first place. They have to be seduced into embracing the message the parties and the politicians have decided to espouse virtually without voter participation.

If my invention is implemented, it will shift the initiative for agenda setting away from political parties and their candidates to voters themselves. Since voters will set the agenda and then select candidates who embrace voters' agendas, there will no longer be a need to have armies of volunteers and paid political operatives dragging voters to the polls.

In fact, it will be the voters and their socio-political networks who will be doing the heavy lifting to make sure their members show up at the polls. But this heavy lifting will be facilitated by the web, email, the twitters of the future, etc.

So I am not as concerned as you are about the difficulties of recruiting people to get out the vote.

In addition, to return to the topic of Millennials, I hope you will bear with me to read the excerpts below from my book explaining why I think Millennials are most likely of all demographic groups to embrace my invention and run with it using their own autonomous, self-organizing social-networks transformed into political networks and voting blocs.

By 2020, the entire Millennial generation will have come of age politically. They will be 103,000,000 strong, of whom 90 million will be "citizen-eligible" to vote. They will comprise 40% of the electorate. They will be numerous enough to play a decisive role in U.S. elections and spearhead the major political realignment forecast by Winograd and Hais.

The progressive direction in which the Millennials are likely to push the country is revealed in recent polls. A majority of Millennials share the critical views of the majority of all Americans who think the country is on the "wrong track". They think politicians are selfishly motivated, politics has become "too partisan", the political tone in Washington is "too negative" and elected officials do not share their priorities.

However, young Millennials differ significantly from the generations immediately preceding them in that they are more actively involved in political campaigns, civic affairs and community-building, both face-to-face locally and virtually over the Internet using web-based social networking technologies. Even though they share other voters' criticisms of the nation's lawmakers and key policies they have enacted, Millennials have more positive and expansive views of what government can and should accomplish.

Studies conducted prior to the 2008 collapse of the U.S. banking and financial system show that even then the vast majority of Millennials did not share the conservative view that government should not intervene in the economy and that unfettered free markets are sufficient to provide prosperity for all. They expressed the progressive belief that government should be a pro-active problem solver even if it means raising taxes to support expanded government services.

As the largest and most ethnically diverse generation in history, Millennials also think government can and should expand opportunity and promote prosperity for all, rather than just a few. Their political stances reflect their "concern for the group" and support for collective action, pragmatism and consensus building.

Since 2003, Millennials have been citing jobs and the economy as their priority issues, presumably because they have experienced so many difficulties getting the jobs they have been seeking in an economy that has been rapidly shedding jobs. Now that the limitations of the free market have been demonstrated, they want government to take a pro-active role in expanding the economy and fostering the creation of good jobs. They also want government to substantially increase its investment in higher education and health care.

Millennials' interest in having government play a more pro-active role in education is likely to stem from continuous cut-backs in federal financial aid programs that offset the rising costs of higher education and the crushing debt college students have assumed as a consequence of borrowing large amounts of money at high interest rates to pay for college.

Similarly, their interest in having government play a more active role in providing health care is presumably due to the fact that large numbers of Millennials are uninsured because they cannot afford to buy health insurance. A 2008 analysis conducted by the Center for American Progress found that 57% of Millennials aged 18 to 29 think that health insurance should come from a government insurance plan, a percentage higher than that of any other age group questioned in the last 30 years. 87% think government should spend more on health care even if it has to raise taxes to pay for it.

Spearheading the Realignment

The de-coupling of government from the control of U.S. voters has harmed the Millennial generation far more than previous generations on policy issues across the board.

While harmful public policies enacted by lawmakers corrupted by conflicts of interest have struck virtually every generation and voting bloc in America over the past fifty years except the wealthy, the political monopolies of the two major political parties have prevented these blocs of voters from forming common fronts to pressure rogue legislators to change their stances. More importantly, the monopolistic control the two parties exercise over the entire political system has prevented blocs of dissatisfied voters from forming common fronts to get control of electoral and legislative processes.

In contrast, by virtue of their voting strength, Millennials are not likely to allow the two parties to prevent them and their progressive compatriots from forming common political fronts to get control of government. The 103 million members of the Millennial generation represent the largest potential pressure group and voting bloc that has ever entered American politics.

Their potential to realign U.S. politics derives from their numbers and the fact that they are united politically by their collective victimization at the hands of the nation's lawmakers. For these lawmakers have sacrificed Millennials' vital interests virtually across the board to those of the wealthy individuals and corporations that finance their campaigns. This is particularly the case on the economic front.

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by: Nancy Bordier @ Sat Jul 11, 2009 at 18:30:08 PM CDT

[ Parent ]

A Byzantine Anti-Democratic Party Apparatus and Electoral Process? (4.00 / 5)

I complement you, Pacific John, on your knowledge of what transpired during the Democratic primary process.

My take is that the two years of primary politics preceding the 2008 presidential election were a disgraceful example of how the democratic process has been subverted by political partisans working inside formal political parties.

Voters were never given the chance to define THEIR policy priorities across the board, as my invention would have allowed them to do, but instead were compelled to choose among disingenuous candidates who did everything to camouflage their real policy agendas.

Obama never came clean during the campaign about what health care reform legislation he was advocating, and is still equivocating today. He says different things to different audiences while using grandiose but vague rhetoric to mesmerize the public.

Yet at the same time he egregiously flouts the popular will by refusing to advocate the single payer system that a majority of the voters favor and that represents the only viable option for reducing health care costs.

Obama's bobbing and weaving is undemocratic and degrades our democracy. He and Congress should come out squarely in favor of the health care legislation that a majority of the people want.

The more they move away from a single payer system the more they prove that they have subverted our democracy and replaced it with a plutocracy consisting of influence-peddling politicians and the corporate special interests that fund their electoral campaigns so they can put them in office to do their bidding.

Here's a quote from my book, Re-Inventing Democracy, about primary and general elections and the extent to which they have been de-democratized by the nation's two major political parties:

The act of voting in elections dominated by the anti-democratic rules and practices of the nation's two major parties is an act not of participation in the governing process but an act of relinquishment, a transfer of sovereignty to party-backed electoral candidates who elevate themselves via the electoral process into the inner sanctums of government. There, they translate their own agendas and those of their special interest benefactors into authoritative decisions backed by the power of the state.

The bottom line is that our undemocratic electoral processes have compelled us to elect lawmakers who feel free to flout the popular will. They have now led the American people and the economy into a ditch that we are not going to get out of it until the emerging progressive majority gets control of government.

And this progressive majority is only going to get control of government if we invent novel ways to empower progressives to organize from the bottom up, as Paul stated above, so they can circumvent the anti-democratic practices of the two major political parties.

Signing petitions, launching attack ad campaigns in the electoral districts of lawmakers flouting the majority will of their constituents, and funding progressive candidates are all necessary and indispensable.

But we must simultaneously use our ingenuity and pool our resources to empower voters at the grassroots to reset the nation's policy priorities and wrest control of electoral processes from the parties and special interests who have turned elections into shams that chronically elect lawmakers who flout the popular will.

---

by: Nancy Bordier @ Sat Jul 11, 2009 at 16:17:02 PM CDT

[ Parent ]

Breath Mint? Candy Mint? (4.00 / 3)

According to this comparison, the Latino vote was 8% of the electorate in 2004 and 9% in 2008, so its 27-point swing from '04 to '08 amounted to a margin shift of 2.5% of the total electorate.  The 18-29 vote was 17% in '04 and 18% in '08, so its 25-point  swing amounted to a margin shift of 4.6% of the total electorate.  Obviously, there was some double counting there from young Latino's but not enough to invalidate Nancy's point.

The drop in GOP ID is a different story, amounting to a shift of 4.4% of the total electorate, but combined with lower support for McCain among the GOP, the combined effect was a swing of 6.3% of the electorate.  However, this is where Nancy's argument really kicks in, since it's very well established that younger voters are the most volatile in their identification, and many of these voters were new voters in 2008.  This is the moving dynamic that will only become increasingly important in the future.

The second issue you raise--about the meaning of "progressive"--has a lot more meat on it, as I've written repeatedly in the past.  And much will depend, in the long run, on how well we'll be able to unite across race, class and gender lines.  This is a very important, and very thorny issue.

However, I don't want it to pre-empt progress in taking up Nancy's idea.  Those who know their organizing history well will recall that Alinsky decided in the 1970s that he needed to start shifting his attention to organizing the middle class, figuring that it alone had the potential power to resist the consolidation of corporate power he saw threatening both the middle and the working class.

There are deep problems involved here, which educationaction has done the most to illuminate here at Open Left.  I have also written about how these same divisions complicated matters after the ambiguous realignment of 1896.  Yet, I think that Alinsky's central recognition was correct--if we're to have any chance at all to work out the problems of uniting across different conceptions of who "we" are, we've got to first stop the tidal wave of destruction heading for us, and in this effort, we can't afford the perfect to be the enemy of the good enough.

That most emphatically does not mean we should forget about these issues, much less stop working on them.  Rather, we have to keep working on both fronts at the same time, not letting work on either one cripple the other.

"Senate passes expanded GI bill despite Bush, McCain opposition"

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by: Paul Rosenberg @ Sat Jul 11, 2009 at 15:34:44 PM CDT

[ Parent ]

Perhaps (0.00 / 0)

but the Latino vote swung from Bush in 04 to Obama in 08.  Did the youth vote, that trends Dem shift that much? I didn't see it when I looked at exit polls.

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by: Pacific John @ Sat Jul 11, 2009 at 16:28:44 PM CDT

[ Parent ]

No Way, Dude! (4.00 / 1)

but the Latino vote swung from Bush in 04 to Obama in 08.

Bush lost the Latino vote in '04, same as Republicans always do.  He just made it closer. Click the link (same as above) and you'll see he lost 44-53.  McCain lost 31-67. That's +14 Dem, -13 Rep, for a total swing of 27.

You'll see that 18-29 vote swung from 54-45 in '04 to 66-32 in '08.  That's +12 Dem, -13 Rep, total swing 25, only marginally smaller than the Latino swing, but in a much larger demographic.

Plus, of course, the Willie C. Velasquez Institute (research arm of Southwest Voter) produced strong evidence that Bush's Latino share in '04 was exaggerated by a few points.

"Senate passes expanded GI bill despite Bush, McCain opposition"

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by: Paul Rosenberg @ Sat Jul 11, 2009 at 16:52:10 PM CDT

[ Parent ]

Um (0.00 / 0)

You're saying what I'm saying about Hispanics who swung our way by +27.

I did go back and verify your numbers in the CNN exit polls. I drew a different conclusion when I first looked at it, and I'll have to figure out what my thinking was.

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by: Pacific John @ Sat Jul 11, 2009 at 18:11:23 PM CDT

[ Parent ]

'Issue/Concept-Granularity' doesn't seem right for mass-marketing (0.00 / 0)

(Please keep in mind that I don't fully grasp where you are heading, so my comments might be 'off'.)

On the one hand, the deck of card issues seem way too simplistic to serve as anything more than starting points for groups that have a degree of sympathetic overlap, but who nevertheless want to forge a concensus. On the other hand, there may be too many disparate issues for the incidental citizens to deal with - i.e., low information voters, occasional voters, etc. IMO, your #1 target should be "the masses", for whom a McDonald's level of e-democracy is a huge step forward, provided it's coupled with them showing up on election day and primary day. One has to assume that "the masses" do not want to spend any more time getting their government to respond, than some minimum which you and I might find laughable. You would do well to serve the politically active class, but if the tool doesn't get adopted by the non-activist class, I have to assume that it's effects will be minimal. There is nothing wrong with creating the e-democracy equivalent of a 4 star restaurant. However, if you only create a 4 star restaurant, you will fail. Somebody needs to create the e-democracy equivalent of McDonald's restaurants - and lots of them. These are for people who want cheap, quick, occasional forays into democracy. The activist class needs to be catered to, but I see their importance within the system as deriving mostly from their ability (which you will hopefully be enhancing) to guide the more numerous citizens who hew to a McDonald's level of participation, into the right directions. A complex society relies on division of labor, and there's no reason to suppose that a democracy should shy away from an intelligent and non-corrupt division of labor, also.

In terms of what I called 'Issue/Concept-Granularity', what is needed is a "sweet-spot", which allows the issues of greatest concern to the public at large to bubble to the top. These are the issues, few in number but already in the public consciousness, which should, IMO, be such that voters can have a hand in choosing the details of the elaboration of their solution, if they choose to get involved, at that level. But for "incidental citizens" (idiotes, the Ancient Athenians would call them), IMO the initial contact with them should involve only 4-8 issues which the activist class has already determined to be of most importance, in the public's eyes. These can always be adjusted, with time. Indeed, assuming some issues actually get solved satisfactorily by a rejuvenated democracy, the list will have to change! A static list implies unending failure....

I think Nancy, or similarly minded activists, can provide considerable value-added to a democratic consensus-building process by making a reasoned first stab at a vote bloc typology, and then 'pre-digesting' top priority issues in light of that typology. This will be different from what I understand has already been done here. Another task for kick-starting democracy 2.0 is to find intellectual leaders who will champion their particular point of view with respect to the initial, reduced set of high-priority issues. These intellectual leaders will be allied with (and sometime identical with) political leaders who will rally their respective voting blocs. However, as consensus is the ultimate goal, all intellectual and political leaders should educate about the system, even as they attempt to recruit into their particular voting block. An honest discussion of the nature of compromise may dampen spirits, but the net/net of empowering populist positions against that of the plutocratic class will more than compensate most voters.

Although I haven't studied the reference he provided carefully, Paul Rosenberg recently referred to a Pew Research Center determined typology. While most of their defining questions strike me a simplistic to the point of silly, maybe there's enough "there, there" to use their typology as a starting point. What Nancy, and like-minded folks could do is come up with a typology at least this good, use widely available polling data to make an initial determination of the "top 7 issues" of concern to the public, at large, create initial policy statement of where each of the (let's say) 9 typological groups would come down on solving each of these top 7 issues, and proceed from there. (It's probably advisable to avoid any wedge issues, should they nevertheless make it into the "top 7".) In terms of a "deck of cards" paradigm, I am saying that, on Day 1, in terms of what's initially presented to the general public, there should be only 7 types of cards, with up to 9 different policy positions for each issue (I imagine there will be some overlap, so having 9 distinct policy positions per issue should not be considered a hard constraint.) The 'pitch' then, is "Look, fellow citizen, we've done our homework, and know that these are the top 7 issues, to the public, at large. We want you to join a voting bloc of like-minded citizens who think like you do, which will make sure that the public's will is done with respect to each of those 7 issues. Unless you're a real outlier, by voting with a bloc, you're sure to get at least some of your concerns taken care of in Congress, as we replace plutocratic lackeys with real, public servants. If you want to get deeper into the process - addressing more issues, proselytizing at a layman's level to non-participants, becoming an intellectual or political leader within your voting bloc, organizing fund-raisers for candidates, running as a candidate, etc. - that is available to you, also. For now, though, we are asking for
1) 15 minutes of your time to start the determination of which initial voting bloc you should join (this will be enough time to read all 9 positions - perhaps summarized - for 1 or 2 of the 7 priority issues)
2) perhaps an hour of your time, online from the comfort of your own home, to finish the process of determining which initial voting bloc you would feel most comfortable in
3) you to register (as required) and vote in primaries and generals and
4) you to tell your friends and family to join one of the 9 voting blocs - regardless of which one that might be."

To get the candidates elected that will carry the populist torch(es), IMO we cannot afford to respect party loyalty niceties. The similarities of the Democratic and Republican parties in defying the public will needs to be underscored, and no loyalty to them should be encouraged or even respected. I have sketeched out the sort of party-hopping, trans-partisan approach that we need to make rapid progress in displacing the corporatist boot-lickers from Congress, here. Please note that "not respecting party loyalty niceties" does not mean "start a 3rd party". It basically means to vote strategically, within the confines of the two main political parties, but not in a way that respects them as being essential, or due a level of respect which has not been reciprocated. "The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath", Jesus said, and a similar thought applies here.

I heard from Lawrence Lessig just this morning, who confessed that he is still struggling with the best way to proceed in a truly trans- or multi- partisan manner, in Change-Congress. This may be a harder problem than I am taking it to be, but with a Congress so out-of-touch, it would be crazy not to attempt to unite Democratic, Republican and Independent voters behind candidates who will represent their collective will (at least in the prioritized sense that I have indicated), regardless of whether or not those candidates have a D, R, or I after their names.

==============

When you state

The new Congress and president elected in 2008 have so far only made things worse by authorizing a $12.8 trillion bailout of insolvent mega-banks and speculative financial institutions that should have been broken up to create a decentralized system comprised of solvent, trustworthy, non-predatory institutions.

, this is a factual error. The total budget deficit for 2009 is estimated to be $1.845 trillion. I believe the 12.8 trillion figure is total debt, which jumped by 1 trillion in October, 2008. That was before Obama was elected... PerotCharts is showing the national debt as $11.535 trillion, and increasing by $4 billion / day.

DemocracyABC.org
TheRealNews.Com
http://www.pdamerica.org

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by: metamars @ Sat Jul 11, 2009 at 20:10:16 PM CDT

facilitating the development of 'pre-tested' trans-partisan strategies would be worth its weight in gold (0.00 / 0)

In my reply to Lessig (see below), I suggested that he talk to Jim Turner, one of the co-authors of "Voice of the People: The Transpartisan Imperative in American Life". A very worthwhile contribution would be to assemble disparate voting blocs, and have them negotiate a trans-partisan strategy that they could agree on (presumably involving party-hopping). For starters, I'm thinking two voting blocs of 100 people, each. (1 of Democrats and 1 of Republicans). I have made a good-faith guess regarding what a core issue transpartisan commitment, on the part of candidates, is sufficient to obtain a trans-partisan commitment, on the part of voters. However, it's basically a common-sense guess, which should be expanded to involve more than 1 issue, and which I've run past nobody (other than posting on blogs).

IMO, this would be an excellent trial run, and a very timely one, due to the banking, economy, and health care crises getting the public's attention. I'm pretty sure that you will find that automating a consensus process cannot be fully accomplished, in the sense of artificial intelligence. Even if a suitable way to represent a policy position in a computer is found, computing differences and conceptual intermediates would be an additional research project that, as far as I know, hasn't been done. However, there is lots of low hanging fruit via social networking, so propagating the consensus reached by, say, a "typical" virtual group of Republicans and and a "typical" virtual groups of Democrats, to Democrats and Republicans in general, should be well within reach. If inter-group consensus is reached via leaders negotiating over a plain, old-fashioned telephone, while intra-group communication is via online polls and forums, that is no tragedy.

Great! May I suggest that you talk to former Nader Raider Jim Turner, one of the co-authors of "Voice of the People"? He has a regular radio show on the progressive radio network: http://turner.progressiveradionetwork.org/. He usually deals with health issues, but he also gets into trans-partisan approaches to solving problems.

He works for citizens for health ( http://www.citizens.org/taxonomy/term/31/0 ) , and their "About Us" page suggests an issue tailor made for trans-partisan buy in, viz., health freedom:

  Mission statement

Citizens for Health is the national nonprofit consumer advocacy group working to broaden health care options, create an integrative health system based on wellness, and advance the freedom to make health choices.  We promote the fundamental policies needed to improve health choices and information in the U.S. and the world.  We work with grassroots and education organizations and the private sector to insure consumer access to a wide range of therapies, a healthy environment, safe foods, and the dietary supplements of their choice.  We foster active citizen leadership and organize natural health consumers to create political solutions that support these rights. read more

  Who is Citizens for Health?

Citizens for Health was formed by a group of ordinary people who believed that good health is a right. Over 120 million Americans regularly use dietary supplements, eat organic foods or visit alternative medical practitioners.

(emphasis mine)

I'm not sure whether or not he has any compelling ideas about forging a viable trans-partisan  movement, but he's been at it long enough that he must have insights into what doesn't work. If you go this route, be sure to also contact Gary Null (garynull.com), who has been a health activist for over 30 years. He found out, early on, how just being right on an issue doesn't automatically translate into correct political action by Congress. Gary Null started the Progressive Radio Network that Turner's show is hosted on, and it is growing by leaps and bounds. If you come up with a strategy to help dump lots of intransigent incumbents, and can convince Gary of it's viability, my guess is that he would leap at the opportunity to help enlist his audience in the cause.

DemocracyABC.org
TheRealNews.Com
http://www.pdamerica.org

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by: metamars @ Sun Jul 12, 2009 at 15:00:05 PM CDT

[ Parent ]

This bloomberg article says 9.7 trillion "risked" by public on bailouts (0.00 / 0)

From U.S. Taxpayers Risk $9.7 Trillion on Bailout Programs (Update1)

Feb. 9 (Bloomberg) -- The stimulus package the U.S. Congress is completing would raise the government's commitment to solving the financial crisis to $9.7 trillion, enough to pay off more than 90 percent of the nation's home mortgages.

The Federal Reserve, Treasury Department and Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation have lent or spent almost $3 trillion over the past two years and pledged up to $5.7 trillion more. The Senate is to vote this week on an economic-stimulus measure of at least $780 billion.

So, it looks like you're in the right ballpark, though I don't have a firm grasp on what is meant by "risked".

DemocracyABC.org
TheRealNews.Com
http://www.pdamerica.org

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by: metamars @ Sun Jul 12, 2009 at 16:44:43 PM CDT

[ Parent ]

Concerns and Queries (0.00 / 0)

General comment:

As I noted earlier, a core concern about this is the apparent lack of internal self-critique.  I would be much more comfortable if it didn't feel like being converted to a religion.  I am very uncomfortable with people who push a particular perspective without being very clear about their internal limitations.  And I frankly don't believe that people without a good sense of the limitations and problems with their ideas really understand the ideas they are putting out.

This may be unfair, and I don't have the time to read your longer entry, to say nothing of the book.  But you should be able to clearly lay out the limitations, tensions, and problems with your idea here.  And you should make them part of your core presentation IMHO.

A number of people have stated problems and issues, but in your responses, as far as I can see, you rarely acknowledge more than something like "you've given me something to think about".  

Below are some fairly random concerns written pretty quickly about this idea.  Many of them I've stated earlier, some perhaps better framed by Paul or metamars or etc.  My point is not to attack this idea, but to pry out some issues and limitations.  

One other core concern is about the empirical support behind your general statements.  Some of it sounds good.  But have you tried it out?  What happened?  No test, no system.  This is true even with something as simple as surveys and polls.  What you get out of a test is rarely the kinds of answers you actually wanted.  Have you tested it?  Rigorously?  If so, what key changes turned out to be necessary.

If you have not, then the intensity of your commitment seems misplaced.

My point, again, is not that this is a bad idea, but that the depth of commitment to it seems problematic in the face of the evidence I have seen in these summaries and the (perhaps only to me) one-sidedness of you apparent arguments for it.  Reality is always messier, dirtier, and crappier than the systems we develop to corral it.

--Creating pressure blocs

Since many Millennials already have experience working in electoral campaigns, they will immediately see how they can use their networks to pressure political parties to let them participate in party agenda-setting and candidate selection processes.

But electoral campaigns and pressure groups are not the same-in fact as I've argued elsewhere, they are significantly different.  Learning one may be of limited use in creating the other.

--Policy is not equal to good candidate
Policy is not the same as a good candidate.  Most voters know this on a gut level and I think they are right.  You can't be sure candidates will stick to particular policy commitments (in fact they almost never will in a world where the actual specifics of the realistic alternatives shift).  

--Leadership
This assumes the desire and workability of a very flat version of democracy.  But as metamars notes, what we need are really good leaders.  Flat democracy won't work in a world where most people aren't policy wonks, have limited time to participate, just don't give a damn about all the details, etc.  As I've noted elsewhere, this is a vision of "other" people as being like "us" (e.g., middle-class professionals) who really want to all have our individual opinions heard on all the details.  

It seems like there is a deep focus here on individuals contacting other individuals.  But that can be a mess.  Isn't there a need for the location of key leaders and supporters?  Not so PC but maybe more realistic?

--Focus on Opinion polls

political parties that use, or have been created by voters' political networks that use the website's agenda setting services and opinion poll, can query the website's opinion poll database to ascertain whether there are a sufficient number of voters who share their policy priorities to provide the required number of signatures

But there is a lot of evidence that people really reveal their policy convictions in deep discussions and deliberation (e.g. Fishkin if I remember right).  So polling people about what they think may actually be self-destructive in some ways.  

--Fragmentation

But instead of splintering the electorate into a multitude of fragmented groups or parties, any number of networks/voting blocs can use the invention's consensus building tools and services, which are accessible on a single website, to come together in self-organizing federations they create at any level of government to build common agendas and use them to nominate and elect candidates who will enact their agendas into law. They can transform their political networks into formal political parties if they wish, or operate inside existing parties.
The federations can be short-lived or they can exist indefinitely, as long as there are people who want to use them to set their agendas and influence the political process to run and elect candidates who will enact their agendas into law.

These are assumptions.  Interesting assumptions.  What if you are wrong?  What if this makes things "worse"?  These are empirical and not abstract questions.  Without empirical testing, there is really no way to know.

--Framing and the Deck
You have framed the alternatives by segmenting the policy world.  This act of segmentation is itself political.  Inevitably, one must limit choices to allow choices.  There is always a balance between "mcdonaldization" and utter chaos.  But every segmentation system always has trade-offs.  What have yours been?  What gets lost?  Why?

--Policy Agendas vs. Core Policy commitments
Is it more powerful to define one's entire slate of policy priorities, or to focus in on one's key commitments?  Might this breadth actually decrease the impact of those holding core policy commitments?  In the political world, might this complex specificity actually be disempowering in that it allows a focus on picky details that politicians can game in different ways?  Maybe it's more powerful to be a key supporter of the Sierra Club and damn the torpedoes on the rest (odd metaphor, but okay).

I'm no political scientist, so these are my general issues on a quick read when I need to go read a good fantasy novel(1) :)

(1) Night of Knives by Ian Casseron Esslemont, part of the Tales of Malazan series by Steven Erickson-good deep gut-level fantasy that doesn't worry about the needs of the audience.  Only printed in Britain originally because they didn't think Americans could handle it.  Awesome stuff-even if you have to read it twice to figure out what's going on.  First book in the series Gardens of the Moon Go Brigeburners!).

http://www.amazon.com/Gardens-...

--Aaron Schutz (Core Dilemmas of Community Organizing)

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by: educationaction @ Sat Jul 11, 2009 at 21:31:18 PM CDT

Religion? (4.00 / 2)

My former Sunday school teachers would be delighted to hear that someone thinks I have a religion!

Let me take this opportunity to draw a few distinctions.

My invention is just that, a blueprint for a set of web-based tools and services that voters can use free of charge to get control of government.

I filed a patent application to register the invention with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, built a prototype of a website to illustrate how the invention might work, and wrote a book to explain how it might help solve current political and economic crises.

My current objective is to see whether Open Left members see merit in the invention, what suggestions they might have for improving it, and who might be interested in collaborating with me to move it to the next stage.

Given this early stage of its genesis, the invention has yet to go through the rigors of standard development processes. So many of the questions you raise, while interesting and deserving of attention at a later stage, are simply premature at this stage.

But I would also make the following distinction. It is always useful and indeed necessary and indispensable, at the appropriate stage, to seriously consider the objections of Doubting Thomases and naysayers like yourself. That's because many of their objections will be entirely correct and need to be addressed.

However, at this stage, what I am looking for are fellow visionaries. . . folks like myself who can see possibilities before they become obvious. I do believe that at this stage of the maturation process of a unique idea, what inventors like myself most need are other people who can also get a glimpse of the possibilities that might lie ahead and are willing to offer up their suggestions of how to realize these possibilities.

Right now, I am indeed a "true believer" that the invention I have envisioned for changing our electoral system would create a far better system than the one we have. But that is a belief, not a statement of fact. What I am looking for are people who share this belief, intuition, inkling. I am looking for collaborators who can envision possibilities and possess enough confidence to go forward to surmount the difficulties that lie ahead.

You, Aaron, are clearly not one of them.

You are an early critic and you have articulated at least a dozen major objections to the whole idea in your comments last week and this week. They may all be valid.

While I am absolutely convinced that my invention would transform our current electoral system into a far democratic one, I do not believe that the invention as it stands could not be improved, advantageously combined with other tools and services, and/or superceded by something that I have not imagined.

So while I will definitely want to have the benefit of your critical analysis of the shortcomings of my approach at the appropriate time, and while I do appreciate the opportunity of considering your objections and responding to them (tomorrow, given that it is after midnight here on the East coast), I must also acknowledge that I cannot give them the consideration they merit because they are simply premature at this point in time.

I hope you enjoyed your fantasy novel! Possibly I could temper my contempt for what our supposedly democratic government is doing if I spent time reading such literature.

 

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by: Nancy Bordier @ Sat Jul 11, 2009 at 23:57:40 PM CDT

[ Parent ]

Thanks for the Gracious Response (0.00 / 0)

And what you say may be legitimate.  It depends on what you are proposing.

If you are proposing a brainstorming session about how to move forward around some proposed principles, then your response is right on target.

However, if you are proposing a tool that may need to be tweaked, but that you think is essentially correct, then I'm not sure the response is completely legit.

As far as I can tell, you are asking for "collaborators" on something that you have basically completed.  You want to tweak it, but you have patented the core conceptions, so I assume that you assume it won't really change that much.

In this case, it does not seem legitimate to say that you can avoid questions like this at this stage.  

This is relevant even to Paul's point that this may be a good tool for a smaller group of activists.  It wasn't designed for a smaller group of activists.  And there is always a dangerwhen you take something designed for one purpose and then use it for something else (although it may work fine).  

(I worked on an assessment project where the assessment didn't seem to work as well as we would have liked, but it did seem to help teachers with professional development.  But it wasn't designed for professional development, and focused teachers on a subset of activities we could try to assess.  In other words, the activities selected for assessment were based on assessment goals and not professional develoment goals.  So it explicitly didn't include key aspects of being a good teacher that we couldn't assess well.  So as a professional development tool it would have been problematic--focusing teachers potentially on the wrong set of holistic activities key for good teaching).

The kind of questions I have asked are still relevant in the latter case.  And the importance of really thinking deeply about the limitations and internal tensions of the project.

It still seems problematic to present such a detailed "patented" process as a "true believer" without having ever actually tested it or engaged (publicly) deeply in the likely problems it may have.  

You want collaborators, but how open are you to facing the possibility that we need to throw out core aspects of your vision because they are, in fact, unworkable or inaccurate and involve problematic assumptions about how the political world operates?  

How can you have "confidence" to go forward without first really subjecting the idea to focused critique and test.  (Yes, I'm a pragmatist like Paul--more Deweyan, even if Dewey is way more boring than James).

You may convince people you are right, but in fact be wrong.

 

--Aaron Schutz (Core Dilemmas of Community Organizing)

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by: educationaction @ Sun Jul 12, 2009 at 08:35:54 AM CDT

[ Parent ]

Just To Clarify Two Things (4.00 / 1)

This is relevant even to Paul's point that this may be a good tool for a smaller group of activists.  It wasn't designed for a smaller group of activists.  [1] And there is always a dangerwhen you take something designed for one purpose and then use it for something else (although it may work fine).  

[2] (Yes, I'm a pragmatist like Paul--more Deweyan, even if Dewey is way more boring than James).

While [1] is certainly true in general, my take here is that of [2] Jamesian pragmatism in this sense:  I see it as an intrinsically valuable tool that could be used for a variety of purposes.  It could also--like any tool--be abused as well.  You've pointed out a wide range of practical difficulties that need to be addressed, and there are certainly others as well.  But, on the other hand, there are also potential synergies with other emergent new ideas.  Thus, the overarching value that I see here is simply that of opening up new horizons of possibility.

I'm in an odd position here, in that I agree wholeheartedly in the kind of realism about how people process political information and the wide range of ways in which people engage and disengage in political processes (both electroal and not), yet at the same time, I think that Nancy's idealist has its pragmatic justification as well.  Without a belief in a radically different possible future that transcends the sorts of questions you raise, it's doubtful that any sort of major transformative change would ever take place.

So, I see the value in what each of you are up to, as deeply opposite as your approaches may be, and I understand this bifrucated view of things in terms of Jamesian pragmatism, which he often expressed in terms of opposing tensions (Hume vs. Kant in Principles of Psychology, for example, or the conflicting scientific imperatives of "seek truth" and "shun error").


"Senate passes expanded GI bill despite Bush, McCain opposition"

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by: Paul Rosenberg @ Sun Jul 12, 2009 at 09:31:21 AM CDT

[ Parent ]

Initial Sunday Morning Reaction to Your Objections (4.00 / 1)

From 2003 to 2008, I taught a university course in which the participants worked in teams to build a business plan around an original Internet business they conceived.

During every session, each team would present the class as a whole an update on their progress in developing their plan, and respond to questions and concerns expressed by other class members. At the last session of the course, each team would pitch their plan to the class as a whole, each of whom was playing the role of investor. At the end, each would tell how much, if anything, they were investing in each plan.

Interestingly, some of the students actually launched businesses built around their plans.

One of the things I tried to teach class participants was the importance of being constructive in expressing their concerns so they did not dent the enthusiasm that the teams were developing for their ideas. I advocated phrasing their criticisms in terms of suggesting specific improvements rather than just knocking down ideas or approaches.

One of the things I advised them was to be careful who they shared their ideas with during formative stages lest they get knocked off their feet by negative personalities.

I was always pleased to see how much the participants took all of this advice to heart. Since they were competing with each other to rack up the highest amount of investments, this was not always easy.

Which gets me back to your objections, Aaron. From the get go, I had the impression that rather than help me improve my core ideas, you were trying to list as many reasons why they will not work.

Here's a quote from your post above that I construe to support this impression:

You want collaborators, but how open are you to facing the possibility that we need to throw out core aspects of your vision because they are, in fact, unworkable or inaccurate and involve problematic assumptions about how the political world operates?

To me, the preceding paragraph is so sweepingly negative in the way it is expressed that it simply makes me gasp.

I have been working with entrepreneurs since 1994, having founded an incubator for Internet start-ups and served as its managing director for four years. Added to my teaching entrepreneurship, this experience spans more than a decade.

During that time, I do not recall ever making such a sweeping statement to any entrepreneur calling into question just about every basic aspect of what they were trying to accomplish.

In point of fact, I have run for public office (mayor of a city of 50,000 people) during which I interacted with hundreds of voters. I originally conceived the ideas behind my invention at a Meetup in support of Howard Dean's 2004 presidential primary campaign. I was also awarded Ph.D. and M.A. degrees in political science from the Graduate Faculties of Columbia University and have taught political science in four universities. On the technology front, I served as senior market planner at the launch of a $1 billion telecommunications start-up founded by IBM, CBS and Sears.

Moreover, I lived and worked in Washington, D.C. from 2002 through 2008 observing the workings of Congress and the presidency and using my analytic tools as a political scientist to try to figure out what had happened to our democracy. I have been an online political activist since that time, which is why I attended Howard Dean's Meetup, which was organized over the Internet.

So when you write about the

possibility that we need to throw out core aspects of your vision because they are, in fact, unworkable or inaccurate and involve problematic assumptions about how the political world operates

I do question whether you would be a helpful collaborator.

I would certainly give your objections serious consideration at the appropriate time, but I tend to doubt that I would seek you out as a fellow visionary who could help me further my original idea.

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by: Nancy Bordier @ Sun Jul 12, 2009 at 10:51:10 AM CDT

[ Parent ]

Something Interesting Here (4.00 / 1)

I see you responding to educationaction within the framework of business development.  But he's clearly coming from a political perspective that differs in some crucial ways.

One of those ways is that businesses enter a marketplace where different entities can coexist in an amorphously diverse number of ways, while attempts to fundamentally restructure our politics are about the larger context in which we all operate.

My own mediating position between the two of you is that:

(1) Your invention is well worthwhile even if it doesn't fundamentally restructure our politics, because I see it as contributing to the process of building citizen engagement, feeding the hunger for fundamental change, and giving people experience working outside the established channels.  You want more than this, and well you should.  But you also want support for moving forward, and my argument to others who might support you is that even partial success would make this project well worth supporting.  This is, essentially, a business-styled argument--here's a venture worth supporting, because it will make a positive difference, even if it doesn't save the world on its own.

(2) educationaction's objections are appropriate for the forum of political strategy discussions, which is a different sort of forum than business development forum.  I wanted to try to distinguish these two fora in having a two-phase discussion, but that turned out not to be practicable.  Thus, we're in the midst of a sort of free-wheeling combination of the two, and since we can't undo or control that, we can at least work to distinguish both how we hear and how we respond to these two different kinds of responses going both ways.

(3) Our greatest hope, I think, is that none of us can see the future, that it will be radically different, not just than our parochial elites imagine, but radically different than any of us can imagine. We know, of course, that human nature will not change.  But we also know that human nature has many potentials that have only been very poorly understood, particularly in combination with one another.  So we should all strive to keep this in mind, even when our interlocutors forget from time to time.

"Senate passes expanded GI bill despite Bush, McCain opposition"

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by: Paul Rosenberg @ Sun Jul 12, 2009 at 11:34:16 AM CDT

[ Parent ]

Right. (0.00 / 0)

Wish I'd waited for your response.  Mine would have been much shorter :)

--Aaron Schutz (Core Dilemmas of Community Organizing)

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by: educationaction @ Sun Jul 12, 2009 at 12:02:03 PM CDT

[ Parent ]

But you are not an entrepreneur trying to build a business (0.00 / 0)

you are attempting to intervene in the political process.  To the extent you are successful, your intervention will affect others in a very different way than if you started a business.  

You are not trying to build a private space to make money, you are trying to change how the public space works.

You are trying to recruit resources and others to a particular point of view about how politics works.  To the extent you do this, and to the extent you are wrong on quite practical terms, this can be pretty problematic.

Perhaps I am being unfair--perhaps you are open to the possibility that evidence will show that your approach is wrong-headed in some fundamental ways.  It doesn't sound like it, since you seem not to have looked too hard for counter-examples.  You can be open to this possibility while still being a champion.  

The issue is one of degree as was pointed out in the comments around Neibuhr on a prior post this weekend.

To the extent that your recruitment leads to some fairly limited tests of this, well, that would be great.  (And, in fact, that is the most likely outcome.)  As long as you are open to the possibility that you might be wrong.  

You are right that I am not the right collaborator--I see too many potential issues with your particular approach, and too much evidence you haven't taken enough time (from my perspective) to seriously engage in self-critique drawing on perspectives different from yours.

In respect to Paul's question, I don't think that what I am saying limits "a belief in a radically different possible future" but a pragmatist approaches this future in a more experimental, more empiricist fashion.  A pragmatist is more likely to try to convert people to the possibility of the construction of the kind of community Nancy envisions in a general sense, with a much more empiricist, open approach instead of to a specific untested tool to create that community.

However, what I've argued elsewhere about Dewey is that he was committed to a transformative vision of democracy that has proved at least so far to be unachievable on a practical level, and that a continuing commitment to his "flat" vision of democracy on a broad scale drains off resources in service of what is effectively a fantasy that could better be used on more empirically effective approaches.  In other words, even in his embrace of a vaguer vision, he ended up leading many of his compatriots in a problematic direction.  (Of course, that was the direction they wanted to go in.)  

In the end, however, Nancy is not Dewey, and doesn't have his level of influence over progressives in the present day.  Again, to the extent that the practical upshot of her vision is a set of limited tests that lead to an improved tool with a better sense of what it can and can't do, that's great.  But she seems to be arguing for a step much farther beyond that for this tool.  That's what I see as problematic.

--Aaron Schutz (Core Dilemmas of Community Organizing)

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by: educationaction @ Sun Jul 12, 2009 at 11:47:35 AM CDT

[ Parent ]

Political Entrepreneurship (0.00 / 0)

Let me respond simultaneously to both of your comments above.

I consider myself a political entrepreneur according to the definition found in the Wikipedia:

someone (usually active in the fields of either politics or business) who founds a new political project, group, or political party

So I am not comfortable with the dicotomy Paul draws in the following statement:

I see you responding to educationaction within the framework of business development.  But he's clearly coming from a political perspective that differs in some crucial ways.

One of those ways is that businesses enter a marketplace where different entities can coexist in an amorphously diverse number of ways, while attempts to fundamentally restructure our politics are about the larger context in which we all operate.

My goal is to provide a web-based set of tools and services that empower voters to "fundamentally restructure our politics".

Not only does this goal require me to be the seasoned political scientist/university professor and political analyst and activist that I am, but an entrepreneur as well, which has been my metier since 1991.

Reaching this goal requires the dovetailing of both political and entrepreneurial skill sets. Most importantly, it will require building a business and business model around my invention that can generate the revenue needed to provide the invention's web-based tools and services free to individual voters and the members of the political networks they create.

The way I see it, I have to play the roles of political entrepreneur and business entrepreneur at the same time.

The latter has its own set of requirements. I have to be able to build a core team within the business to transform the invention into user-friendly tools and services available to any voter via a single website. But of equal importance, I must attract investors who concur that the need is there and that the invention, when fully tested, developed and deployed, will meet that need.

Once the team and investors are on board, we can then proceed to collaboratively develop and beta test our web-based tools and services to ascertain that they do in fact meet the need, that the need is scalable, and that the business will provide investors a return on their investment.

Any investment, and the incremental payment of specified portions of the investment, will be conditional on meeting the various milestones and benchmarks set forth in the business plan. This is where we will need to show that we have fully considered all possible objections, like those stated by Aaron, as well as any pitfalls that may be encountered along the way.

The team and the investors will want as much proof as possible that actual voters will use the tools and services that we provide. To the extent that we provide this proof, we will be able to continue. If we do not, then further incremental payments of the overall investment will be discontinued and the launch of the business will be aborted.

These are just the ABCs of how entrepreneurial start-ups are financed, developed, tested and launched.

I think it should be obvious that at the present stage of inception, many of the things that Aaron thinks should already have been done have not been done because it would have been premature to do so.

In terms of questioning the basic assumptions behind my invention, I have been doing that every day for nearly five years to convince MYSELF that it was worth pursuing.

I keep testing it against all the other strategies that are being pursued or recommended to empower voters to get control of the electoral system so they can set the nation's policy priorities and elect representatives who will enact them into law.

But I always returned to my original idea because I did not see any that were superior to it. Aaron has not yet provided us any clues as to what he finds more promising, but only that he doubts the promise of mine.

What I am pretty sure about, at this stage, is that the number of people who grasp my invention's possibilities will be entirely adequate to get a business built around it funded and staffed with the brightest minds so that the tools and services it has spawned can be developed, tested and launched, assuming, of course, that the results of the product development and testing phase are positive.

It may take some time, but I have little doubt about the eventual outcome.

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by: Nancy Bordier @ Sun Jul 12, 2009 at 13:40:52 PM CDT

[ Parent ]

Post Script (0.00 / 0)

I want to add that I have already built a business model and business plan that I am confident can generate the revenues needed to provide the web-based tools and services free to individual voters and the members of their networks, as well as provide a respectable return on investment to investors.

In addition, I want to note that over the past week, I estimate that roughly a dozen Open Left members have expressed positive views about the invention's potential, with just one expressing negative views.

I should also add that Google Analytics has enabled me to see that in the week that has passed since we starting discussing the invention here on Open Left, 95 people from 58 cities have visited the Re-Inventing Democracy website to read about the ideas behind the invention, as well as a description of its origin and how it works. In addition, 49 people from 35 cities have visited the Citizens' Winning Hands website during the same period. Of course I have no way of know who they are.

So I am quite happy to know that my invention is at least being considered by people in so many different cities across the U.S., and I am optimistic that good will come out of the exposure in the long run.

And of course I am deeply grateful to Paul and the members of the Open Left community who have taken the time to look into what I am proposing and share their thoughts and suggestions.

The Internet and a blog like Open Left are amazing phenomena where many otherwise unattainable goals become attainable because so many of us can use them to pool our ideas and our hopes and dreams for making the world a better place. Per the tag line of Citizens Winning Hands, all you have to do is "Take a Stand. Find Allies. Build Networks. Change the World."  

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by: Nancy Bordier @ Sun Jul 12, 2009 at 16:29:37 PM CDT

[ Parent ]

Just A Minute, Though.... (0.00 / 0)

It's obvious to me that you don't normally think of yourself primarily as a business entrepreneur. Nor do I.  And I even took that for granted in the way I shaped my response.

But you did invoke that framework when you responded to educationaction.  And that becomes problematical.  As you yourself go on to say:

I have to play the roles of political entrepreneur and business entrepreneur at the same time.

I don't think this is an easily navigable situation to be in, so I'm not intending to be judgmental.  But precisely because it is so tricky, I want to be as honest and precise as I can, in order to actually support you in what's inherently a tricky juggling act.

"Senate passes expanded GI bill despite Bush, McCain opposition"

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by: Paul Rosenberg @ Sun Jul 12, 2009 at 16:36:13 PM CDT

[ Parent ]

How Do We Fund "Do-Good" Projects? (0.00 / 0)

Right now, given the economic situation and the serial implosions of non-profits due to the fallout of the Madoff Ponzi scheme, the foundations that normally fund non-profit "Do-Good" projects are finding it extremely difficult to come up with the funds that these efforts require. Many of them are having to cut staff and even close up shop.

Things are so bad that we are losing newspapers right and left and many of the mainstays like the New York Times and the Washington Post are at risk — primarily because their business models no longer work in the Internet age.

It might be possible and even advisable for my invention and the business built around it to be run as a non-profit, provided that the funds needed are available.

But even so, I have known from the outset that I needed to develop revenue streams that would be adequate to enable the tools and services to be made available for free to individual voters and members of their networks.

This was not easy but I figured out how a business model and plan could be developed that would do this. But those future revenue streams are just that, they lie in the future. To actually build out the website prototype is going to take capital from outside sources.

So whether the business built around the invention is run as a non-profit or a for-profit, capital has to be attracted to fund the initial development of the website.

As you may know, social investing is flowering into a key component of our economy. It view this sector as the most likely source of the capital that I need to launch the website.

Social investors are looking for businesses that serve the public good, create jobs and operate in the black. They help people like me turn their ideas into viable businesses that generate their own revenue streams so they do not have to depend on philanthropy to keep going.

So that's where I see the intersection of my invention as a political tool to empower voters to re-democratize our electoral processes and my responsibility as a business entrepreneur to figure out how to make it a viable business that can pay its bills.

I have been quite surprised and delighted that I have been able to apply my entrepreneurial business development skills to identifying revenue streams that may well be robust enough to enable the web-based tools and services spawned by my invention to be given free of charge of individual voters and the members of their networks.

For these revenue streams provide the whole enterprise with its unique political potential and its unique business/financial potential to pay its own way, assuming initial financing from the social investment sector.  

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by: Nancy Bordier @ Sun Jul 12, 2009 at 17:19:29 PM CDT

[ Parent ]

I'm Sure You Know Much More About This Side of Things Than I Do (4.00 / 1)

But it does seem only natural that once you reach a "take-off" point, it will cost relatively little to scale up further.  Not nothing, of course, but it seems like the heavy lifting would be front-loaded on a number of fronts.

This is one reason that I suggested before the idea of adapting it for a municipal issues model.  It would open up an entirely new avenue of securing interest and support.

"Senate passes expanded GI bill despite Bush, McCain opposition"

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by: Paul Rosenberg @ Sun Jul 12, 2009 at 18:40:57 PM CDT

[ Parent ]

This Will be My final Comment (0.00 / 0)

I think it should be obvious that at the present stage of inception, many of the things that Aaron thinks should already have been done have not been done because it would have been premature to do so.

No, as I've noted, it is not obvious.

This is where we will need to show that we have fully considered all possible objections, like those stated by Aaron, as well as any pitfalls that may be encountered along the way.

Actually, I think you should be answering some (many) of these more basic questions much earlier and at least do some kind of small scale test BEFORE you go asking people to give money for this--more than money for a substantive test.

In terms of questioning the basic assumptions behind my invention, I have been doing that every day for nearly five years to convince MYSELF that it was worth pursuing.

But the number of issues that you have not addressed, and your seeming resistance to reasonable critiques that are pretty basic seem so large that it raises questions about how far outside your own perspective you have been able to get.  The point is not about what YOU believe.  But about how convincing in general your argument is, given you are making an argument about how OUR public sphere should be structured.

But I always returned to my original idea because I did not see any that were superior to it. Aaron has not yet provided us any clues as to what he finds more promising, but only that he doubts the promise of mine.

I'm sorry, Nancy, but comments like these often seem like the last refuge of those who resist actually engaging in debate about the actual issues in play.  If you understood your model well enough you could answer some of these questions instead of seeming aggrieved that they are being asked.  You will note that you haven't answered any of my concerns, as far as I can tell.  Instead you have spillied a lot of pixels asserting that you don't have to actually address any of them, or it's the wrong time, etc.  Which raises questions about how interested you actually are in a substantive discussion of the specifics of your proposal.  

Actually, I have made many suggestions about concrete things "we" could do elsewhere, albeit not on this specific topic.  But that is really irrelevant.

In any case, I wish you well.  I hope the model works.  And I look forward to seeing examples of it being tested.  I hope you are more welcoming of critique and willing to engage in dialogue about the substance of your proposals in the future.

Since we aren't actually discussing the specifics, there doesn't seem to be much use in continuing the discussion.

Good luck.  

--Aaron Schutz (Core Dilemmas of Community Organizing)

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by: educationaction @ Sun Jul 12, 2009 at 22:59:25 PM CDT

[ Parent ]

Good-Bye (0.00 / 0)

In response to your above comment entitled "This Will Be My Final Comment" I quote below two other comments you made above:

This may be unfair, and I don't have the time to read your longer entry, to say nothing of the book.

I'm no political scientist, so these are my general issues on a quick read when I need to go read a good fantasy novel(1) :)

I am struck by the disparity of the time you have devoted to questioning my assumptions in your comments above and last week, versus the time you have devoted to reading the information I have provided, namely my online book referenced above, which describes how I conceived of the invention at a face-to-face campaign event, and surfing the prototype website that illustrates how the invention could serve the needs of individual voters and their networks.

As you know now, I am a political scientist. I have played an active role in the political process for the past 20 years. I have run for elective office and played a part in online campaigns to support and finance the campaigns of candidates who are using the web. It was my attendance at a campaign event that sparked the creation of my invention.

Moreover I am thoroughly familiar with social networking technologies, which played a key role in Obama's election and are at the core of my invention. Understanding how social networks can be transformed into online political networks and winning voting blocs is key to understanding the confidence I have that my invention will prove successful in providing web-based tools and services that empower bottom-up self-organizing, to use Paul Rosenberg's apt characterization.

What I think is that you and I would have had a more constructive dialogue if you had spent less time in broadside attacks and more time trying to figure out what I am proposing, such as by reading what I have written. You have experience in community organizing that I do not have and I suspect that I could have learned important things from your experience if it had been presented in a constructive way.  

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by: Nancy Bordier @ Mon Jul 13, 2009 at 10:23:07 AM CDT

[ Parent ]

Really impressive! (4.00 / 2)

I don't remember if it was in 2000 or 2004, but I decided to write up a "voters" platform, because I was sick of the Party platform. Either way, it was before I had a blog, and I didn't know what else to do with it. Even when I had a blog, I didn't have enough of a following...

The main thing was I didn't know how to solve the problems of scale or aggragating people.

And you've done that!

What is most exciting is the possibility for fielding candidates who might actually be sensitive to their consitutents' needs. Current electoral politics pretty much make that an impossibility.  

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by: Karen M @ Sat Jul 11, 2009 at 22:28:02 PM CDT

Thanks So Much! (0.00 / 0)

Your enthusiastic reaction is most heartening!

It is exactly what I am looking for - confirmation that my invention meets real needs that other people have also recognized.

So please stay tuned!

We will need you as we put the ideas behind the invention into motion!

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by: Nancy Bordier @ Sat Jul 11, 2009 at 23:12:35 PM CDT

[ Parent ]

If this tool works half as well as you predict (4.00 / 2)

and actually begins to alter the landscape of political power in this nation. The question that comes to my mind is: how will the currently entrenched power brokers respond to their displacement?

First they'll ignore you, but we know how that quotation ends.

When push becomes shove, they'll fight back. Apparently, money is their main resource. Aristocratic familial connections, too. How corruptible is your mechanism? Can a few individuals with access to huge piles of money co-opt this tool and use it to maintain their current hegemony? Say by hiring participants or creating virtual "voters" (votebots?) that can skew the polls and statistics?

Please don't take these questions as criticism. Rather, I see great potential in what you have created, and push-back seems inevitable.

"It sounds wrong...
     ...but its right."

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by: SpitBall @ Sun Jul 12, 2009 at 00:48:54 AM CDT

Good Question (4.00 / 1)

One of the things I have been doing as I worked on this invention over the past four years is to raise questions like those you raise in your comment.

Of course there are more, but as long as people like you collaborate with me to keep ahead of those who might want to undermine the idea, I have no doubt we will prevail.

My legal and technical advisors have helped me identify many of these possibilities and figure out how to circumvent them.

My view is that my invention is just an idea whose time has come. I just happened to be in a problematic situation that I could only resolve via the invention. I took the time in the ensuing years to flesh it out in my mind as I watched in horror what was transpiring in Washington, D.C. (where I lived in the outskirts).

So I have done everything I can - filing a patent application, creating a website prototype, writing a book and publishing it online for people to read free of charge, and then putting it out to the Open Left community. My sense is that those of you who are taking the time to explore the possibilities I have presented will be there to move this forward with me, and that somehow or other, we will be invincible!!!!!

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by: Nancy Bordier @ Sun Jul 12, 2009 at 11:04:14 AM CDT

[ Parent ]

Good to hear (0.00 / 0)

"One of the things I have been doing as I worked on this invention over the past four years is to raise questions like those you raise in your comment. "

Questions are kind of my forte and doubt my constant companion. I think it was Pete Sinfield that summed it up:

"Confusion will be my epitaph as I crawl a cracked and broken path. If we make it, we can all sit back and laugh. But, I fear tomorrow I'll be crying." E.L.P. recorded it.

You've sincerely piqued my interest and that rarely happens in the political realm. Well, in a way that is not cynical or satirical, that is.

Thank you.

"It sounds wrong...
     ...but its right."

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by: SpitBall @ Sun Jul 12, 2009 at 21:31:58 PM CDT

[ Parent ]

Absolutely the kind of stuff we need! (4.00 / 2)

Some Random thoughts.

I suppose that authoritarians could join up and do their agendas. My take is that in such situations the means tends to justify the ends.

Copyright 2008 - Register coming soon. I guess that coming soon is measured in tens of months at this point.

So Paul I hope you keep following this effort and will let us know when it's ready for prime time.

At one level this is one of those "If everyone did X" presentations. Which are always true. If everyone laid down their arms we'd have world peace. etc.

My version of this has always been Direct Democracy by Delegable Proxy. See I don't really care to read tons of position papers in order to decide which I like. I always wanted others to read and decide for me and then I would give them my real-time online proxy vote to represent me to my Representative in congress. etc. Now sure some I want to read, and with those perhaps I woild represent others as they so chose.

Jeff Wegerson - Prairie State Blue

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by: wegerje @ Sun Jul 12, 2009 at 10:43:33 AM CDT